The Splendid Failure of Occupation
Part 31: Achtung! We can invent a pretext to conquer you
By B. J. Sabri
Online Journal Contributing Writer


Apr 12, 2005, 16:12

�Tribal sovereignty means that; it's sovereign. I mean, you're a�you've been given sovereignty, and you're viewed as a sovereign entity. And therefore the relationship between the federal government and tribes is one between sovereign entities."�George W. Bush, Washington, DC, Aug. 6, 2004 [Emphasis added] [Source] [Watch video]

American pretexts for colonialist expansions, military interventions, or wars, share a peculiar makeup. They are systematic, never in self-defense, and always have two sides: a true intent (real objective) and a declared aim (propagandistic objective).

True intent includes expanding the reach of U.S. corporations, establishing military supremacy to protect what the U.S. call �national interests,� or encroaching on the wealth and sovereignty of foreign states. Declared aim includes pretexts. These could be moralizing, legalistic, phony humanitarian solidarity, bogus human rights issues, �spreading� freedom, �national security� issues, and so forth.

Since the foundation of the empire-republic, pretexts have formed the core of American expansionist doctrines. Because it is the product of contradictory ideological factors, I call this core, Inherent Contradictory Dualism (ICD). ICD is an ambivalent mechanism that the United States has been using assiduously as an operative tool of foreign policy. The praxis of U.S. imperialism, however, is not dependent on mystified dualism. While dualism applies to conceptual contrast between two entities as in the philosophical construct: mind and matter, or to opposing forces as in the theological: good and evil, ICD applies to long experimented and socially promulgated ideological-material systems. In these systems, declared objective and true intent of the imperialist enterprise can co-exist as one force despite their irreconcilability.

But, declared objective and true intent present a paradox: (1) on one side, they form the official basis of U.S. rationales for interventions, and (2) on the other, they have no relations before, during, or after an intervention. In other words, while the true intent of the intervention undergoes physical implementation, U.S. propaganda intensely and solely divulges the declared objective of the same. For example, from the time that George W. Bush disparaged the United Nations in September 2002 where he prospected that the U.S. would take unilateral action against Iraq until the invasion and the fall of Baghdad [April 9, 2003], the declared objective that we heard ad nauseam was �to disarm Iraq from its weapons of mass destruction.� Once the occupation settled in, the original declared objective disappeared, leaving the space for a new set of declared objectives, while the true intent kept floating around implicitly.

Still, why do I call this praxis, �inherent,� as if it were an inborn quality of the American Empire? Of course, nothing is inherent in nature except physical properties and genetic traits of, respectively, inorganic and organic matters. But ruses and expedients to implement hegemony have permeated the fabric of U.S. imperialistic ideology, mentality, culture, and institutions, to the point of infusion with state and society.

In his essay, An Explanation of History , author David Maurer hit on the same idea of declared objective and true intent as when he described the situation in World War II:

This explanation of World War II as a war fought for empires and colonies may sound a little strange to most Americans. Allied war propaganda seldom focused on the idea of empire. When Britain was at its lowest point after the evacuation from Dunkirk, it needed a rallying cry to help mobilize the population. They did not say: we must fight the Germans because they want to conquer an empire like ours. Instead, they proclaimed: we must fight the Germans because the evil dictator, Adolph Hitler, hates democracy and wants to conquer the world. [Emphasis added]

When the Americans joined the war, they adopted this same propaganda strategy. They did not say: we must fight the Japanese because they sank our fleet in order to clear the way to conquer an empire in Asia, and we must fight the Germans because they declared war on us to prevent our weapons from getting to the British. They declared: we must fight the evil dictators in Germany and Japan because they hate democratic countries, and they are trying to conquer the world. This was not true, but it was effective wartime propaganda. It has often been said that the first casualty in war is truth. [Emphasis added]

An eloquent example of ICD on an ideological level is the recent speech that Bush delivered at Fort Hood during an Easter service (2005). Said Bush:

I want to wish all the fellow citizens and their families a happy Easter," Bush told reporters after the service. "We prayed for peace, we prayed for our soldiers and their families. It's an honor to be here at Fort Hood to celebrate Easter with those who wear the nation's uniform." [Emphasis added] [Source]

First of all, if world organizations that deal with crimes against humanity have any decency and are not controlled by Washington, they should indict Bush for mass murder, put him on trial and sentence him to years in prison that are equal to the estimate of people he wantonly murdered in Iraq and in Afghanistan. A mass murderer such as Bush, who declared fascist wars against the Arab people, and who invaded and occupied two sovereign states (Afghanistan and Iraq), is the perfect example of ICD. How preposterous is it that a bigoted man who frothed and still froths for war could �pray for peace?� Concisely, Bush gave us a demonstration on how ICD works�he proffered peace while he was thinking war.

Generally, details of implemented U.S. imperialist policy do not correspond to the claims invented to justify it. While the U.S. brags about democracy, it assassinates it; while it jabbers about freedom, it occupies defenseless countries; and while it talks about free elections in countries it occupies, it selects candidates (collaborationists) who work to perpetuate its occupation. Not surprising, but, historically, the documented chasm that separates between U.S. claims and imperialist reality is so unbridgeable that it would make any U.S. protestation to the contrary an exercise in absurdity.         

The most recent example of ICD appeared (March 28, 2005) in the voice of U.S. Zionism, The New York Times, under the headline, �U.S. Helped to Prepare the Way for Kyrgyzstan's Uprising.� Commenting on the turmoil and potential civil war that the United Sates is fomenting in that central Asian country, Craig S. Smith gave the following supremacist-racist appraisal:

In addition to the United States, several European countries�Britain, the Netherlands and Norway among them�have helped underwrite programs to develop democracy and civil society in this country. The effort played a crucial role in preparing the ground for the popular uprising that swept opposition politicians to power. [Source]

What is the declared objective of the United States to prepare for uprising in Kyrgyzstan?

Smith answered, �To help underwrite programs to develop democracy and civil society.� This categorically implies that American fascism, since before manifest destiny, still views foreign people as savages requiring taming and civilization. But our study of history tells us that Asia and Africa created great civilizations before Greece and Rome, and that they created civil societies and their own form of government before any other civilizations on earth. So why do imperialist U.S. and Europe want to export to them their �democracy� and �civil� models? It is superfluous to state that the U. S. pretext for wanting to institute �civil� society models in Kyrgyzstan hides a true intent: consolidate the American military presence, bring pro-U.S. forces into power, surround Russia, expand U.S.-controlled territory surrounding Afghanistan, and to continue the bogus war on terror (read, colonialism) against predominately Muslim states.

In all attributes, the scope of imposing colonialism on foreign people is no different from the scope of an armed attack against a jewelry store. Both, colonialism and the store attack have one thing in common: robbery. By all definitions, robbery is the unlawful and violent expropriation of wealth owned by others. But, while colonialism involves the use of state resources to carry out a robbery, the jewelry store attack uses the resources of one or more individuals and has a specific scope: the seizure of transferable wealth�money or jewelry. Because colonialism is essentially a state piracy, it is more complex and its effects are long lasting: it seizes lands, natural resources, cattle, homes, established cities, buildings, history, and it imposes loathsome primitive slavery on the inhabitants.

Whenever we review the history of colonialism, the scene is immutable: the colonizer always has a pretext to conquer you. For example, when Hitler occupied Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Poland under the pretext of taking back lost territories inhabited by German-speaking people, he was actually implementing Lebensraum (vital space, read colonialism,) a centerpiece of his Nazi ideology. And when European Jewish Zionists seized Palestine (with the crucial intervention of the West) under the pretext that their Austrian, German, Lithuanian, Ukrainian, Russian, and Polish ancestors �lived� in ancient Palestine, they were actually implementing a centerpiece of Zionism.

Among American pretexts for imperialist expansions, one is worth mentioning: the annexation of California. How did President James Polk do that? Answer: he fabricated a pretext to go to war with Mexico of which California was a province. In his masterful book, �No Duty to Retreat: Violence and Values in American History, [Oxford University Press 1991],� Richard Maxwell Brown, a sharp American scholar of U.S. violence described President Polk�s determination to provoke the Mexican-American war. On page 162, Brown wrote:

President James K. Polk�s message to Congress on December 2, 1845, in which he laid out the uncompromising policy toward Mexico whose eventual result was the Mexican-American War of 1846�48, expressed an attitude of no duty to retreat at the presidential level. The Polk Administration�s specific order to General Zachary Taylor to lead his army into disputed territory North of the Rio Grande and to stay there�no matter what armed opposition might be made to him by the Mexicans was an order to Taylor to stand his ground and not to retreat, come what may. Claiming the ground on which Taylor and his men stood, Mexican soldiers attacked a detachment of Taylor�s forces. This quickly led to an American Declaration of war on Mexico. Many Americans then�Including the young Congressman Abraham Lincoln�and some historians later believed that the Polk policy of insisting on Taylor�s standing his ground along the Rio Grande, was, given the failure of aggressive but peaceful diplomacy with Mexico, a policy intended to provoke a war with Mexico for the aim of acquiring the Mexican domain of California . . . [Emphasis added]

The U.S. annexation of the former sovereign kingdom of Hawaii offers another glimpse on the pretext of U.S. imperialism to impose colonialism. Interestingly, the Department of the Navy offers a detailed historical account on the ruses for annexation; but for the purpose of this article, I m proposing an introduction posted on an Internet website dedicated to tourism in Hawaii that offers a terse description of the machination that the United States used to annex the once independent island nation. Allhawaii-cruise.com informs of the annexation of Hawaii as follows:

In 1887, a group of American and other white business leaders, backed by an armed militia they had founded, imposed on the king a new constitution that sharply limited his powers. The so-called Bayonet Constitution also placed new conditions on the right to vote, consolidating the influence of wealthy whites. It required that voters have a yearly income of $600 or own $3,000 in property, a rule that disenfranchised about three-fourths of the native Hawaiian voters. European and American males could vote, even if they were not Hawaiian citizens, but Asian immigrants were excluded.

When Queen Liliuokalani took the throne in 1891, she attempted to regain some of the power the monarchy and native Hawaiians had lost. Much loved by her people, Liliuokalani opposed efforts of the white business community to have Hawaii annexed by the United States, sharing the overwhelmingly popular view that they were motivated by greed. On January 17, 1893, after the queen attempted to impose a new constitution, powerful white leaders occupied the government office building in Honolulu and overthrew the monarchy. The rebels were helped by the official United States representative in Hawaii, who ordered troops from a U.S. warship to land in Honolulu, on the pretext of protecting American lives and property. The rebels proclaimed a provisional government headed by Sanford B. Dole, the son of an American missionary. [Emphasis added]

The annexation of Hawaii had a very precise meaning: after conquering a great part of continental North America, U.S. imperialism began moving westward into the Pacific. One ramification of that annexation (1893) is what happened 10 decades later. On November 23, 1993, Clinton, the first U.S. president in the country�s Zionist phase, signed into law the Congress� Apology Resolution for the U.S. annexation of Hawaii. The following is the preamble to the resolution:

Whereas, prior to the arrival of the first Europeans in 1778, the Native Hawaiian people lived in a highly organized, self-sufficient, subsistent social system based on communal land tenure with a sophisticated language, culture, and religion;

Whereas, from 1826 until 1893, the United States recognized the independence of the Kingdom of Hawaii, extended full and complete diplomatic recognition to the Hawaiian Government, and entered into treaties and conventions with the Hawaiian monarchs to govern commerce and navigation . . .

Whereas, on January 14, 1893 . . . the United States Minister assigned to the sovereign and independent Kingdom of Hawaii conspired with a small group of non-Hawaiian residents of the Kingdom of Hawaii, including citizens of the United States, to overthrow the indigenous and lawful Government of Hawaii;

Whereas, soon thereafter, when informed of the risk of bloodshed with resistance, Queen Liliuokalani issued the following statement yielding her authority to the United States Government rather than to the Provisional Government . . . [Emphasis added]

Politically, morally, and practically, the Apology Resolution is a masterpiece of cosmic deception�its issuance did not alter the political situation of Hawaii today or reverse its annexation. By its own dead weight and cynicism, the resolution is the apex of historical futility, ideological manipulation, and criminal intent. This is for one fundamental reason: every factor, every feature, and every change that the U.S. imprinted with violence on the original Hawaiians, their land, and culture is irreversible. Apologizing for an imperialist annexation while maintaining the structures that produced it, is a pointless exercise in correcting past events.

But, the gist of the resolution and its ideological message go beyond Hawaii. My estimate is that U.S. imperialism has produced a Machiavellian tool to beautify its history of colonialism, thus offering a future model of conduct to the next generation of imperialists, when confronted with false compunctions for crimes committed against foreign people. In essence, the resolution is delivering a message:

We, the United States, can invent any pretext to encroach on your country no matter how distant you are from us. As we encroach, we can kill your father and brothers, dispossess your people, take your home, convert your schools to prisons, install military bases, destroy your culture, change your religion, convert you to slaves to serve us and our economy, destroy your environment, take your wealth, take your land, and use your females to please our soldiers. But, hey, cheer up! One hundred years from today, our grandchildren and future Congress will apologize to the grandchildren of those who, among you, would survive our conquest!

Yet, while the colonization and annexation of Hawaii began with a 19th century encroachment, Iraq�s attempted colonization in the 21st century is abrupt, bloody, and has all the fingerprints of American Modified and Accepted Hitlerism and fascist Zionism. Having this mind, we still have to address questions from part 30. These include the pretexts that Wolfowitz and Cheney fabricated to invade Afghanistan and Iraq: Why did the U.S. not invade both countries at the same time, and why did it obtain all those U.N. resolutions on Iraq to sanction its occupation, but it did not require them for Afghanistan? Interestingly, the ideological key to answer these questions resides somewhere else: Native Nations issues.

Next: Part 32: From Alexander Hamilton and Iroquois to George Bush and Iraqis